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Your work persona and you

23:27 / 20.02.03

Y'know what I mean: that creature into whom you morph when confronted with the inescapable barrage of appraisal, assessment, audit, etc.; that hideously perky version of yourself which feigns necessary enthusiasm in those aspects of the job you really can't be arsed with; the team-player-yet-autonomous-decision-maker you become when you have to package and present yourself to your peers.

This is on my mind lately because I've just emerged from the shadow of my Specialist Registrar Research Presentation. Basically, at my pre-consultant level, we're afforded one day each week to undertake a research project of our choice. Not surprisingly, many of us choose to research Selfridges, the Ritzy or the insides of our eyelids, initiating a long, drawn-out, largely tokenistic piece of research for the sake of appearances. When it comes to presenting the fruits of our half-hearted labours, there's a last-minute rush to massage scanty data into something halfway presentable.

I've been worrying about mine since Christmas, and finally got the damned thing over with on Wednesday. To my considerable surprise, it went rather well, and I think this is partly due to my deciding to change my usual style of presentation. Instead of affecting the standard, faintly cheerleaderesque manner, I was more honest, admitting from the start that I generally disliked having to do research at all, and it'd been really difficult to come up with something which interested me much. Others agreed emphatically, and it felt good to have injected a little more frankness into my own dealings. I like my researcher persona slightly more than before.

Anyway, does this strike a chord with anyone else? Anyone feel required to 'package' themselves for the workplace - and has anyone tried to break through or slide around that packaging? Did it work?

00:28 / 21.02.03

I tried so hard to play dumb, maintain just enough competence to not get fired. I had this whole early Cordy on Buffy thing going on- actively shallow. I don't know when, but I slipped up, and before I knew what was happening I got stuck writing a manual. As a temp secretary, nothing more should be expected of me than a reasonable typing speed and a pulse. I don't get paid nearly enough to be intelligent, and I refuse to give my workplace free use of my brain. You get what you pay for, and they're paying for an IQ of about 85. Anything smarter and I want a damn raise.

I used to feel bad about it, playing dumb, but this is a government job, and this is a place where I don't want my real self to be public. There's something satisfying about having a secret, of being smarter than everyone thinks you are, because then you don't have to discover the limits of your intelligence, which is a nice safe place to be, and you have everyone (who isn't onto you) at a disadvantage.

10:25 / 21.02.03

Does playing down one's intelligence/independent opinion really put others at a disadvantage, though? I mean, it's been my own experience within the medical/psychiatric world that there are certain taboos which must not be broken - we must all, for example, pretend at least some interest in pushing back the boundaries of medical science, even when we know 90something% of research is of little use other than inflating the researcher's CV - but I reckon we often try too hard to stay within (what we perceive to be) those limits. If one's work persona is very different from the rest of one's personality, it becomes quite stressful trying to maintain it.

Am I the only one that finds 'appraisals' deeply cringey?

10:45 / 21.02.03

No, I do too Ganesh.
We're all allowed to be pretty much how we are really at work. Obviously you don't come in smoking pot or anything, but you're allowed to drink (in moderation), wear what you want, have unlimited access to internet, email and phone, time keeping's not really noted, are allowed to go to the cafe if particularly hungover, etc etc. Cos of this, everyone who works here is quite chilled out and no-one really ever takes the piss. Sexism, racism and homophobia are not really issues as they are all frowned on, but without a prescribed "you shall not make remarks".
Therefore appraisals for me are fucking strange. Having my boss and her boss sitting there picking through my self assesment is wierd. Not least becasue I get pissed with my boss probably about 3 times a week. I think the odd formality of appraisals is counter-productive insofar as what they are trying to acheive. As well as the formailty the actual point of appraisals I suppose are a good idea but there should be a better way of doing it.
That said, I'd much prefer a one off (or quarterly) assessment that I knew I had to blag for rather than a continual assessment of my work.
In that respect I have to agree with Mazarine - because although I see what you're saying about being honest with them Ganesh - I'd prefer them to think I was interested in something I wasn't than then think I should be and know I'm not.
Don't worry too much about fitting in to what they want you to be (ie don't try to "package" yourself too much) - this way the conflict caused in maintaining your work persona and normal personality differences will be lessened as long as you remember that if you have to do something for work, you have to do it, and no amount of honesty (as in to thine own self be true) will make this stop.

10:59 / 21.02.03

I'm certainly not suggesting we should all actually admit to being bored shitless by X, Y and Z; I guess I'm querying whether appraiser and appraisee need to maintain quite such a gung-ho facade. With my recent example, I suppose I was pleasantly surprised that it was possible to actually voice my 'I'm not hugely into this but I know I have to do it and here it is' attitude, to any extent. I think it probably helps that I'm now reasonably senior; if I'd said this stuff five years ago, I suspect I might have jeopardised my career prospects...

It's interesting to note which taboos apply within certain work arenas. The 'research is inherently fascinating' one applies to medicine, as does the 'I cannot express negative opinions about my patients' (although the latter has softened considerably, at least in private).

Dances with Gophers

11:39 / 21.02.03

Nice thread!
My work experience is similar to marzine's in a way, ie being badly paid (compared to the real world)and working only to the level of the pay. Though I don't pretend to be less intelligent than I am, I am over modest and I tend to keep my head down. As I post from work my work personna effects my online fiction suit hence Dances with Gophers. Infact I tend to think of my work personna as a fiction suit. I find that moving between fiction suits in different situations, ie work, home, away from home etc is pretty automatic but is not always easy and there is a short period of feeling slightly lost. Anyone else find this or it just me.

12:12 / 21.02.03

Oh yeah, my work persona is definitely a fiction suit - a fairly robustly-delineated one. It spills over into other areas, though, and as you say, it's not always an easy skin to shed on leaving the workplace. What irritates me particularly is when others make big assumptions about me based on this single aspect: I was once involved in a minor traffic accident, when a woman stepped into the path of my reversing car and my tyre went over her foot; she expressed particular outrage that "a doctor" would do this sort of thing, as if a medical degree were some sort of proof against accidents...

12:24 / 21.02.03

I work in a design practice where there are lots of unwritten rules about how dedicated you should be to the 'craft'. This should involve working long hours, building up an encylopaedic design reference library in your head and having an overflowing well of creativity within.

I don't really match the profile but try and fake it enough to enhance my chances of working on the juicy jobs.

Because I don't socialise much with my workmates, what they know about me outside of work is confined to the very limited information that I exchange during chit-chat. At times I'm surprised by their perception of my personality but since this view is based on occasional terse outbursts, snippets of my tv viewing, and overheard personal phone conversations, I suppose I shouldn't be.

Recently I've become more aware of the need to be 'political' in the workplace and how easy it is to be labelled a bit scratchy if you don't play along.

12:26 / 21.02.03

I have a work fictionsuit but it's not really one I use with colleagues or my boss - it's the one I use when I have to go out to lunches, to interviews and so on. I can switch on that person when I need to.

My last work appraisal was very honest - with my boss saying, well, you're a bit prone to this and that, and me laughing and agreeing - and of course promising to make changes that I haven't got round to yet. But I'd agree that it helps to have a level of seniority before you can start to make your cynicism/ apathy a wee bit more apparent.

pointless and uncalled for

14:35 / 21.02.03

I play the narcissistic professional at work. I do a good job, apparently better than most of the non-temps there but may day to day activities are littered with a constant commentary of how much I despise having to turn up and the hopeless level of incompetence in the civil service.

The benefit to this is that I am rarely moody or even discombobulated outside of work, which I see as being a result of dispensing all of my negative energy in work.

As much as I dislike working in the way that I do, there are two flaws to my at work persona, I can't bear to be unemployed and I have an immense work ethic. As is suitably characterised by today when I have, for the first time in three and a half years, taken a day off sick. i assure you that I am not that healthy.

Tryphena Absent

14:48 / 21.02.03

I haven't been employed for ooohhhhh going on 6 months now - the student life - and have refused to get holiday jobs temping etc. because the last time I worked it was absolute and complete hell. I spent my whole time frowning with my arms crossed and generally being completely unapproachable to the point where an acquaintance who I've known for over a year came in to the place and actually didn't recognise me. I turned in to super-bitch, my boss was like Peggy Mitchell off Eastenders except she was nastier and stupider, the regulars were complete idiots (how many times can you explain your degree and have someone reply 'I think therefore I am') and the bosses kids were just... awkward, rude, fussy and hanging over me. In the end my persona was separated so far from myself (I couldn't even smile) that I walked out.

14:55 / 21.02.03

As management scum I find I have a very thin tightrope to walk. On the one hand, I'm the wacky, carefree, subversive Northern clown with just a hint of a scent of sexual danger that you on Barbelith all know and love so well, on the other hand I'm a departmental head with 15 people to take control of, a shitload of different work to do, constant contact with outsiders at all levels and representation at high-level management meetings. So yeah, I guess I have to switch between identities constantly.

But I like to think of myself as an entertainer first, and a boss second.

It must be said I'm not big on giving out bollockings and general office discipline - so long as people get the work done. I too hate appraisals, because I have to do them. Dreadful, dreadful things.

15:12 / 21.02.03

But I like to think of myself as an entertainer first, and a boss second.
- basically a chilled-out entertainer?

Dances with Gophers

15:16 / 21.02.03

See if I can post this with out another paranoia attack. Cynicism is directly proportional to time in role but like fiction suits is handy in dealing with the petty beurocracy (can't even spell it!) that is at the moment a big source of frustration at the moment.
This job goes from being the best job in the world to the worst and if I was being myself in work I would have left, which is something I would regret(I think

).

16:42 / 21.02.03

Ah, but Sax: money don't make your world go round; you're reachin' out to a higher ground.

Mustn't be too sniffy about management, since I'm expected to seek *shudder* management experience almost as avidly as research...

22:24 / 21.02.03

I lost the plot last night. Started telling my Quality Coach that all life on Earth is Yggdrasil when viewed as an entire entity from outside time. I was shaking with released energy - she wore an expression blanker than the worthless fluid that comes from Tony Blair's testicles.

They Must Not Know The Real Me.

my cockroach Gonzalez

22:29 / 21.02.03

never ever mention AK-47's during an appraisal. those doped up Fight Club sessions can really come back at ya.

23:01 / 21.02.03

Does playing down one's intelligence/independent opinion really put others at a disadvantage, though?

Perhaps not- but it puts me at an advantage, for a few reasons.

1. I cannot be permenantly hired unless I take a government given exam to see if I'm fit to hold the job I already hold as a temp.
2. I cannot be paid for more than 30 hours a week. No overtime.
3. If I show even the slightest sign of being capable of doing a task, it will very likely be assigned to me, and I will be expected to complete it, whether or not it can actually be done in the 30 hours I work.

So basically, the smarter I seem, the more work outside of my job description I'll be assigned for the same amount of money. I will not get credit for most of it, and I cannot be promoted. There is zero incentive to go above and beyond my job description, and no logical reason to do so.

Except for maybe pure protestant work ethic. But I don't have that.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

10:18 / 22.02.03

Coming from the person who complained about finding it hard work to be me in social situations, Flowers the Librarian is very similar to . However, I have until now always been on the lowest rung of the Professional Ladder and my work environment is generally not very hierarchical so there has never been much of a feeling that I should be 'yes m'am' ing and 'no ma'ming' my way around. I'm not aware of any politics surrounding me that I need to be particularly careful of in order to not wake up in a cardboard box one day.

However, now that I'm approaching a position where I could start moving up that management ladder I'm beginning to wonder whether changes will need to be made to Flowers the Potential Managers OS...